brand-e

By Hugh Jordan. Creativity shop. All companies rely on ideas, which are the bread and butter of any good business. And Ogilvy is a bit of in ideas factory, having worked with some of the world’s biggest brands.
Feeling philanthropic, the agency decided to offer its services to local firms in the Brixton area of London. The best bit is, it didn’t charge a penny.
From 4th to 6th February, Ogilvy’s Idea Shop moved into an empty Brixton storefront. It was manned by more than 50 agency staff – all of them volunteering their time and expertise – who assisted 63 businesses during the brief opening.
“The event outstripped my expectations,” says Ruth Jamieson, who organised the event for Ogilvy. “I have had some lovely e-mails from the people we helped, thanking us and letting us know about their future plans.”
Over 200 businesses applied for agency advice – among them a shiatsu practitioner, an independent record label and Kid City, an activities organiser for inner-city children. Such was the demand, meetings spilled out of the Idea Shop and into cafes in the surrounding area – inadvertently helping local businesses by helping local businesses.
“What has been really satisfying is that because we are working with small companies they can move quickly,” says Jamieson. “Kid City has adjusted its recruitment ads, like we suggested, and other businesses have redesigned logos and are already implementing what we discussed with them.”
And Jamieson says it is not only local businesses which benefited from the three-day event – it proved a useful exercise for agency staff too.
“Ogilvy is a 360-degree company so it was good to work with people from across the firm,” says Jamieson. “I work at Ogilvy One and it was really useful for me to work alongside staff from Ogilvy PR, Ogilvy Action and Ogilvy Advertising, for us to be able to come together as a network.”
Plus, there are auxiliary benefits from helping smaller companies.
“Anything we can do for small businesses to help them get through the recession is going to be good for the economy,” says Jamieson. “It will be small businesses that kickstart the economy again, and that will have a knock on effect for big business.”
She adds that these outfits might well be the big businesses of tomorrow, so it’s useful for Ogilvy to make contact with them now.
The agency has plans for another Idea Shop pop-up in May, this time in East London. The location has yet to be decided but Jamieson says it is likely to be somewhere in Tower Hamlets, close to Ogilvy offices.
“If anyone knows of a shopfront going spare, please do let me know,” she says.
Budding entrepreneurs will no doubt be scouting the precincts East London. Advice of this calibre doesn’t often come for free.